A Digital Computer Technique Used in Design of Container Ship

Abstract

The designing of container ships is relatively new in the field of naval architecture and it embraces numerous engineering problems. Among these, the functional relationship between the ship's form and the number of containers stowable in holds is of prime importance at the preliminary design stage. The number of containers carried on deck has an important relation with the ship's stability and seaworthiness. The number of containers to be carried by a container ship determines ship size and, in this sense, is an equivalent measure to the deadweight capacity of an ordinary vessel. Therefore. it is of prime importance to select the most appropriate economical ship size at the preliminary design stage for a given number of containers. This report describes a method of finding the most economic container ship size through the employment of a digital computer, which has been developed by Hitachi Zosen's hull design department.